Winter 2020 Watchlist - The Return of Haikyuu

After a few dry anime seasons - dry for me, anyway - I find myself watching more anime than ever. I wasn’t looking forward to anything this winter other than the return of Haikyuu, but suddenly my watchlists on Crunchyroll and Amazon Prime are flooded with an episode or two of something to watch nearly every day of the week.

But first... the holdovers from fall 2019.

What to say about Babylon... A series that started off as fantastic has now unraveled into a morass.

I really hate to say that about this series, because it was dark and fascinating at first. A new ward in Tokyo adopts a law that makes suicide legal, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. What prosecutor/investigator Zen Seizaki discovers is a conspiracy behind the law involving the ward’s mayor and a mysterious and ultimately terrifying woman - the true villain of the piece – Ai Magase.

There was a break between episode 8 and 9 that lasted one month. Last Monday was Episode 11. The series is listed at MAL as being 12 episodes long. We haven’t seen Ai Magase since Episode 8, the setting changed from Japan to the U.S. for some reason, and the show has gotten lost in philosophizing about good and evil in the abstract, seemingly forgetting its own plot.

I don’t honestly think they can wrap up the series in any real or satisfying way with only one episode left, but I’m invested enough to watch on Monday to see if they can do it.

And then there’s Boruto. One day, I’m going to write a whole post about how Boruto trades too much on our nostalgia for the original characters in Naruto without forcing us to care enough about the new generation of characters... but that day is not today.

Before I talk about Haiykuu... I’ve picked up two other series this season that are nice surprises.

Case Files of Jeweler Richard looks like it would be a light repast, something like the European pastries and royal milk tea the show’s lead character enjoys in his parlor. It is, however, deeper than that.

The fey and lovely Richard is a British jeweler par excellence. He speaks many languages in dealing with his international clientele. One day he’s saved from being attacked by drunken louts by a young Japanese man, Seigi Nakata, who becomes his employee.

Each episode focuses on a single kind of jewel and what its significance is, as a mystery gets solved. Pretty standard stuff, except that the stories so far have been more serious than you’d expect from the set-up. The first episode dealt with Seigi’s own grandmother, who raised him and supported him by – being a thief. The second episode featured a young woman, engaged to a nice young man, who is in severe conflict. It turns out that she is gay, and accepted the engagement in a desperate and doomed attempt to deny her sexuality and the hard road in life it often leads to in Japan.

At the beginning of the episode, Richard cautions Seigi that he is never to show discrimination or judgment toward any of their customers. This is obviously tied in to what the rest of the episode is about, but still, it seems like more than you’d expect from this kind of series.

Oda Cinnamon Nobunaga. With a title like this, you know first off that it’s a comedy. I was expecting it to be one of those satirical anime series where each episode is 8 or 10 minutes long like Skullface Bookseller Honda-san, but actually each episode is the standard 24 minutes or so in length.

Oda Nobunaga, the fierce Warring States general, the scourge of the era, has now been reincarnated in modern-day Japan as a dog named “Cinnamon” by his young female owner.

He’s not alone. The other Warring States generals are here too, and are also dogs: Date “Boo” Masamune, Takeda “Lucky” Shingen, Uesugi “Julian” Kenshin. They and Oda meet up at the local dog park to relive their old battles and reminisce about the past.

It’s light and funny, in part because each sketch or story only lasts a few minutes, followed by some quick funny bits, and then another little story. For a series that only has a single punch line (they’re dogs now!), the producers know that for it to work, they have to keep it moving, and they do.

And now, finally, after a one-season delay, Pet is streaming on Amazon Prime.

Pet was worth the wait. It’s an exploration of what could happen if people had the ability not only to reach into another person’s mind, but also to change their memories. The first episode leaves you a bit puzzled, but the second episode lays out exactly how the “crushers,” as they’re referred to, do it, and it’s a really wild ride.

I never did a review of Haikyuu when the first season came out way back in 2014, so I think I’ll do it now.

Haikyuu is the story of Shoyo Hinata, an enthusiastic, ever-striving volleyball player for Karasuno High. Despite his shrimpy height, he has outsize skills, particularly in jumping insanely high.

His uncomplicated optimism keeps him moving past obstacles, including the people who don’t believe in him. And his radiant smile could power a thousand suns.

As in all shonen sports anime - he has a rival, of sorts.

Tobio Kageyama is already a star in the high school volleyball world, but he has a problem. He’s not a team player, and in fact suffered a dark moment of humiliating rejection from his teammates at his former school after they tired of his self-centered arrogance. When he comes to Karasuno, he’s pretty dismissive of the chibi Hinata, but the odd couple soon becomes the cornerstone of the team’s offense.

Haikyuu - for whatever reason - had a four-year hiatus between this season and the third season back in 2016. I’ll be honest and say that I barely remember what happened in season three, as I don’t follow the manga. It’s not the only anime production that has had a huge gap between seasons (Attack on Titan had a similar long break), but from the more casual fan, in other words, someone who likes Haikyuu but who doesn’t wait with bated breath for each episode - the producers expected an awful lot of patience here.

In any event... Haikyuu follows the basic shonen sports story template to a T. A scrappy but underperforming high school team learns to work together, with each individual player fighting to overcome his own personal obstacles, until they begin to achieve hard-won successes and ultimately advance to the final round tournament of whatever sport it is they play.

Kuroko’s Basketball is by far still my favorite anime in this genre. Plus, the character designs are way more attractive in that series. ;-)

Haikyuu is geared toward more of a younger audience, in my view. The tone is clean and wholesome in that particularly Japanese way of encouraging boys to do their best, play fair, and support others in order to win. As a shonen sports anime, it’s a model of the genre, following the template nearly flawlessly.

So why am I not as enthusiastic about Haikyuu as I am, say, Kuroko’s Basketball?

Well...

Because it’s VOLLEYBALL.

Forgive me if you’re a fan of the sport, but I don’t find volleyball that compelling. As opposed to basketball, which is inherently exciting, volleyball just doesn’t do it for me. I am completely willing to own this as a personal fault. It’s the reason that I simply like Haikyuu, rather than love it.

In addition to all the new series for winter 2020, I should mention that Crunchyroll is adding value these days in terms of extra episodes of older series, OVAs, and movies. In the past few weeks I’ve enjoyed a number of Naruto Shippuuden movies, Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet OVAs, and best of all - K: Seven Stories, a short anime series in the K universe I never thought I’d get the chance to see. I’m not sure why this explosion of bonus extras is hitting Crunchyroll right now, but it’s really a lot of fun. Keep it up, Crunchyroll. =D

Seiyuu Appreciation Day - The Other Guys

In the current endless run of flashback fillers in Naruto Shippuuden, we're seeing more of Neji now than ever before.

I miss Neji. :-(

Look at Neji's picture above. Now imagine you hear his voice.

...

Were you able to hear him? Neji's seiyuu, Kouichi Toochika, has a very distinctive voice - soft-spoken with a certain husky timbre.

Neji is only one supporting character in the Naruto universe and he even got killed off - but I can still hear Neji's voice if I call up the character in my mind.

Most of the time in these seiyuu posts I talk about the big-name seiyuus, the stars, because they're the ones I see most in anime. But sometimes you'll hear a voice in a supporting role that really catches your attention.

One such supporting character was Kensuke Fukui, the point guard for Yosen in Kuroko's Basketball.

Fukui only has a few lines in several episodes when Yosen battles the main team Seirin in the semi-finals. I didn't even know the character's name until I looked him up for this post - I only thought of him as "the point guard from Yosen with dishwater blond hair and a nice voice." Since that's a mouthful, it's good that I know the character's name now. ;-)

The seiyuu voicing Fukui just had a really nice voice and I noticed it. Warm, masculine, sexy. I looked up the seiyuu and found to my surprise that Kaito Ishikawa has played two main roles in series that I watched, and I didn't recognize him.

First, he was Tobio Kageyama, the second main character in the volleyball anime Haikyuu.

Kageyama is one of the best male tsunderes I've seen in a while. ;-) I mean, look at that expression. XD I couldn't believe Ishikawa played Kageyama and I didn't recognize him as Fukui, but the next surprised me even more:

Ishikawa was Ledo in Gargantia! I didn't recognize him from that role either! And Ledo was a difficult role. You'll recall that the character comes from a different universe and has to learn the language, speaking it hesitantly and with an odd cadence at first.

Ishikawa also played Nine in Zankyou no Terror and has done main roles in other series. So even though I didn't remember his voice from the two big roles I'd heard him in, I heard Ishikawa's voice in this small role as Fukui in Kuroko's Basketball and enjoyed it enough to notice and look up who the seiyuu was.

Often you'll see big-name seiyuu playing special characters in an anime, like in the last Shirobako episode when the director finally comes face to face with the elusive mangaka whose manga MusaAni is adapting. I didn't have to look it up to know it was Takahiro Sakurai playing the mangaka, since I can recognize his voice. =D

But seiyuu who play big roles will also play smaller roles without any fuss or fanfare, like Kaito Ishikawa playing Fukui. Actors love to ply their trade, after all, and every role is another chance to do what they love best.

Thinking of warm and distinctive masculine voices makes me think of Kenji Hamada, who plays Teppei Kiyoshi in Kuroko's Basketball.

Hamada's voice is so distinctive, I've recognized him in two small roles in other series since I first heard him in Kuroko's Basketball.

And then there's Hasumi Itou, whom I've mentioned before, who played Kaoru in Hakuouki, Chizuru's cross-dressing long-lost brother who we see in makeup and a kimono for many episodes until he finally reveals his evil little male self. ;-) Itou is the seiyuu who did that weird, unforgettable scene where her voice slid from fake-female to low-male without a hitch, just a pure slide from one to the other.

Aside from Hakuouki, Itou only has one other credit, as Aoi Toosaka in Fate/Zero. She is definitely a seiyuu to keep one's eye on.

Of course, one of my favorite seiyuu who never gets a main role but is always one of the other guys in a series, is Nobuo Tobita.

Tobita was the star of Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam decades ago, and since then has only done supporting roles. But his beautiful gentle voice remains one of my favorites and hearing him is always a treat.

Finally, talking about supporting seiyuu and being one of the other guys wouldn't be complete without mentioning Shizuka, who finally got a voice acting job in last week's Shirobako episode. Shizuka, you'll remember, was the only one among her college friends who hadn't succeeded in the anime industry yet.

In honor of Shizuka getting her first role, here's a photo of Shizuka's seiyuu, Haruka Chigusa.

In the episode, Aoi Miyamori is in the recording studio when Shizuka walks in to record her role. Miyamori is shocked to see her friend, then nervous for her as she reads her lines, and then finally cries in relief and happiness when Shizuka finishes the acting job without a hitch and to the director's approval.

It was all done without words and was beautiful to watch. Ah well, might as well show you Miyamori's seiyuu's picture as well. Here's Juri Kimura. :-)

Again, if you're not watching Shirobako, you're missing a gem. =D

A Shinji, a Hothead and a Boy Soldier

A Shinji, a hothead and a boy soldier walk into a bar and… no, it’s not the start of a joke. ;)

Three animes are at the top of the list for shonen adventure this season—featuring three very different protagonists.

Valvrave the Liberator has been described as a cross between Gundam and Code Geass. In T.C. (True Calendar) 71, much of humanity lives in space colonies. The first episode shows the neutral colony of JIOR being attacked by the Dorssian Federation, right in the middle of Shinji’sHaruto’s confession to the girl he likes, Shoko.

Shoko runs to help a stalled motorist in the path of the invasion and disappears in a blast. Enraged and full of grief, Haruto jumps into the cockpit of a huge mysterious mecha named Valvrave to take his revenge.

As Haruto tries unsuccessfully to start the mecha, he frets and cries and bemoans the fact that he always fails at everything (as meanwhile—the computer screen directly in front of him is flashing a “Yes” or “No” question the whole time). Haruto finally notices the screen and clicks “Yes.”

The mecha takes off and Haruto defeats his enemies… Okay. It’s pretty standard stuff so far, but Valvrave takes the usual shonen mecha premise and does a few really strange things with it.

By calling Haruto a “Shinji” I mean of course Shinji from Evangelion—the teenage mecha pilot who set the standard for whiny shonen protagonists. Although to be fair—episode two does show Haruto manning up in an unexpected way, so maybe there’s hope for him yet. (He does shed tears again in episode two however. ;))

The Dorssian Federation’s stylish uniforms and grand imperial building designs definitely bring Code Geass’s Britannian Empire to mind; and like the Geass Power there’s a paranormal element that came into play right at the end of episode one that had me saying: “Well… I certainly never expected THAT to happen.”

Moreover, a new and entirely different supernatural event occurs at the beginning of episode two involving Haruto and the enemy soldier L-elf that had me going, uh, WHAT?

And I’ve never seen glossier-looking animation. The characters are glossy to the point of almost glowing. I’m not sure what effect the animators are going for with this, but well, it is quite pretty. XD

The thing with Valvrave the Liberator is that despite all this—or maybe because of all this—it’s incredibly fun to watch. It’s teenage angst plus mechas plus the first paranormal element I can’t name or I’ll spoil it, plus the second paranormal element I can’t name or I’ll spoil it. The producers’ attitude with this anime seems to be, “It’s a train wreck, but isn’t it gloriously FUN to WATCH?” And you know what? It is.

Attack on Titan is the most highly-anticipated shonen series of the season.

Humans live in cities behind giant walls that were built to keep out the Titans, enormous humanoid figures that like to eat humans.

Eren sees his mother get eaten by a Titan in episode one. He’s a fairly normal boy before this event, but afterward becomes an off-the-rails hothead who vows to kill every Titan out there.

The visuals are excellent, and while the previews promise exhilarating action sequences to come I was surprised that the first three episodes were all set-up. The first two episodes are flashbacks to the first attack of the Titans when Eren was young, and the third (after a timeskip) shows Eren and his friends training to become soldiers. I kind of expected them to get into the main plot more quickly than this.

We’re only at the beginning of the series, of course, but Eren’s personality hasn’t endeared me to him so far. He should develop over the course of twenty-five episodes, but for now I’ll continue to watch for the visuals and the story and see where things go from here.

Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet is the shonen anime that impresses me the most so far this season.

Led is a 16-year old combat mecha pilot for the Human Galactic Alliance. In the midst of an enormous space battle against a race of alien beings, Led and his talking mecha Chamber fall through a kind of black hole distorting time and space and wind up on Earth.

Earth has been swamped by gigantic oceans following an ice age melt-off, and humans live on old battleships like islands surrounded by nothing but water.

Led awakes from hibernation and, with his talking mecha translating for him, communicates with the citizens of Gargantia, a fleet of ships. When Gargantia is attacked by pirates, teenage girl Amy asks Led to help. Led and Chamber wipe out the pirates, to the horror of the Gargantians who didn’t expect him to actually kill people.

After Led and the Gargantians start to understand each other better, Led assists in another fight and this time wins the Gargantians’ gratitude and respect. However, he doesn’t understand their words to him—“thank you”—even when Chamber translates them. In the life he came from, no one ever said this to him before.

When we first see Led he’s an efficient killing machine with an expressionless face, giving monotone responses to his commander even in the middle of a crazily escalating space battle. He’s a boy soldier, a child forced to become an adult before time.

He doesn’t know how to react to the cheerful Amy at first, but gradually starts to open up to her. His cold gaze when he kills the pirates reminds us that this is who he’s been; but Amy and the warmly engaging citizens of Gargantia are drawing out who he could be.

Gargantia is a wonderful adventure with a protagonist you can pull for and respect. The contrast between Led and the Gargantians provides a conflict that foreshadows the end: will Led become more human and capable of intimacy with others, or will he revert to being an emotionless boy soldier with a frozen heart?

***

Finally, in deference to the For God’s sake stop reviewing shows when only one or two episodes are out! anime club on MyAnimeList, I will… forego attaching the “Reviews” label to this post. XD